Anime Review! ~ Smile Precure!

Hello my precious fluffy yarn bows! :3

I'm back on my blog today with an anime review I ment to do a little while ago; a review of Smile Precure! ^w^

Smile Precure is one of the only Precure series that was dubbed in english so that's probably the season most people got acquainted with the Precure series! However I didn't watch the english dub as I prefer watching my series in their original language. ~

I always preface my Precure reviews by saying that I watch them in order of release so I haven't watched the most recent series yet. (I started watching Dokidoki in the meantime about a month ago though!) As usual I will try to not reveal major spoilers with my review! :3

Smile Precure

Smile Precure is the 9th season of the Precure franchise and aired back in 2012-2013. It have 48 episodes and a movie. The theme of this Precure series is Fairytales! ^w^

Story

In this series, the Precure have to collect the "Cure Decors" to revive the queen of a land of fairy-tales called Marchenland. The decors have been stolen by the bad guys from the Bad End kingdom which sole purpose is to make every story have a bad ending.

Firstly, I want to say that I loooved the fairytale themes! In some episodes there was heavy connections to actual fairytales stories and I loved that it was inspired by these stories so much! I loved their magical secret base in the big tree stump and their "secret code" with the books to unlock it. ~ I also really liked the Smile Pact they use to transform, it kind of reminded me of the tacts from Ojamajo Doremi too! The pacing was okay with how they had to collect the Cure Decors and you would see kind of a "Villain Clock" thing ticking when they would fight a new monster.

However I felt that some episodes were a bit rushed in the plot developpement. I feel like there was some points that could have been answered more clearly or earlier in the series and it kind of get a bit messy in my opinion? It's nothing major but it was hard to follow at times... Some of their motives to fight also felt a bit rushed and I would have liked a bit more developpement to understand and connect with their motives a bit more... Maybe that's just me being picky though. XD;

Art

The art style was very colourful and bubbly, perfect for a Precure series! ^w^ I enjoyed the fact that the Cure's colours were made to be so bright and not "pastel" like the last few seasons. I also really liked how they made their eyes to be so round (kind of like in Heartcatch?) and the way their hair would flow. The first attacks that they get was quite "basic" for a Precure series in my opinion but the last ones shown in the series are nicely animated and breathtaking with the rainbows and glitters... And kind of overkill to say the least... XD;

Sound

The opening and both of the endings are really really good! XD; I was actually listening to the first ending way before I watched the series because... It was too good of a song. ^w^'' I liked the music that they used in the series, cheerful when it needs to be and more dramatic/fast paced for the fighting scenes, I liked it! ~ I also love Candy's voice so much, I feel like the higher pitch and speech patterns really suit her! :3 None of the Cure's voices really bothered me, same for the villains, they suited their characters and personality nicely. ~

Characters

I feel like the characters are probably one of the weakest point of Smile Precure, sadly... I wanted to like them all so much and enjoy their personalities, but I feel like since there was so many Cures to develop (and the fact that they all appeared at the beginning of the series) that it was hard to make them shine individually and to have a decent character development for them. There was probably one or two character development episodes per Cure (and I understand that they did with the amount of episodes they had) but it was hard to connect with them and their personalities in such a short time.

I loved Cure Happy and Cure Peace personalities; I feel like they tried to make Cure Peace a bit more "not stereotypical" and quirky because she is the soft and shy one that loves drawing but she also likes Mechas and Sentais... XD; I couldn't really connect with Cure Sunny and Cure March... I felt like their personalities and hobbys were kind of interchangeable being the ones that are hardworking, liked sports and supporting their families and stuff... Cure Beauty was okay, she was a bit stereotypical but it didn't annoy me as much and I ended up liking her with the very few development episodes she had.

The villains however were much nicely developed in my opinion. There was like 3 main ones, Aka Oni, Majorina and Wolfurun which are based around a demon/ogre, a bad witch and a mean wolf. XD; Very stereotypical for what it is but I really enjoyed it anyway! ^w^'' They have very distinct personalities and I liked how at the end there was a bit of redemption for them. They were made for comic relief and silliness more than anything and they were pretty likeable, as villains that is. The other villains were Joker and Pierrot. Joker was kind of the "leader" of the villains and was much more mean and evil. Pierrot which was the biiig bad villain that they had to defeat at the end and you kind of never see/hear about him until the end of the series.

Enjoyment

I really enjoyed the series despite the weak points I mentioned earlier. The villains were so nicely written and developed that it kind of compensated for the Cures that weren't. XD. I loved the attacks, I loved the transformation/attack items, their secret base (I which they would have shown it more though!) the theme of the series too and Candy is probably one of my favourite fairies up to now! I can see why Smile Precure is listed as a "fan favourite" Precure series! ^w^

Overall I give Smile Precure a rating of 8 out of 10!

I hope you enjoyed my review! ^w^ Until next time my precious sparkly strawberries, take care! :3

Best of Daily Outfits! ~ October 2019!

Hello my cute frosty snowflakes! :3

I'm back on my blog today with my very first "Best of" outfit post! ~ It's definitely a new posting and blogging format for me so it may take me a while to get used to it! ^w^''

It was kind of hard for me to chose which outfits to post also; I didn't want my post to be too short or just basically post all my outfits like I was doing before... XD; I finally made my choice and I decided to share 4 outfits from the end of October for this time. ~

As usual, I wore these outfits for work unless stated otherwise! ~ I hope you'll enjoy them, let's start! :3

~ Outfit from October 21st! ~

Headbow; Oo Jia

Blouse; Dear Celine

Skirt; Oo Jia

Socks; Secret Shop

Shoes; An*Tai*Na

Bag; Loris

Accessories; Paradise Rose

It's been a while since I wore a gingham/Country Lolita print without my straw hat; I missed wearing the marching headbow with them! ~ This time, I coordinated my blue gingham skirt with pink and accessories themed around animals! :3

~ Outfit from October 22nd! ~

Headbow; Oo Jia

Blouse; Dear Celine

Jumperskirt; Oo Jia

Socks; Bodyline

Shoes; An*Tai*Na

Bag; Loris

Accessories; Paradise Rose & Chocomint

I always love a good outfit with my Cherry Berry Bunny dress! ^w^ This time, I coordinated it with white and some little touches of pink. ~ I also chose accessories themed around bunnies! :3 I decided to share that outfit because I really loved how my makeup turned out that day! ~ I love wearing white eyeshadow! ^w^

~ Outfit from October 29th! ~

Headbow; Oo Jia

Blouse; Oo Jia

Jumperskirt; Oo Jia

Socks; Bodyline

Shoes; An*Tai*Na

Bag; Loris

Accessories; Holley Tea Time, Kawaii Goods & Chocomint

On that day I decided to wear an outfit I haven't worn before! ^w^ I coordinated my lilac Milky Planet jumperskirt with my lilac blouse! ~ It's the first time that I wear that dress in a monochrome coordinate and I really liked it! :3 I chose accessories that had a bit of pink in them to tie in the socks and I chose colourful starry accessories to match with my bag that added a bit of a pop of colour to the outfit! :3

~ Outfit from October 30th! ~

Headbow; Oo Jia

Dress; Oo Jia

Socks; Bodyline

Shoes; An*Tai*Na

Bag; Loris

Accessories; Chocomint, Rococo Soul & Offbrand (Handmade)

For that outfit I coordinated my Vanilla-chan OP with pink! ~ I tried to tone down the outfit and the print by choosing minimal and simple accessories along with plain socks too. :3 Even if that outfit was more simple than the others, I really liked that coordinate! ^w^

Well, I hope you enjoyed my best of outfits of the end of October! ~ It was a hard decision to make to stop sharing all my outfits, but I think that it helped me feel less trapped and more creative just for myself and not only for the sake of sharing my outfits on here. ;o;

Until next time my yummy minty chocolates, take care! :3

The end of an era? ~ Tomoyo’s Secret Garden 3.0?

Hello my lovely cuddly kittens! ~

I'm back on my blog today to write a bit about what's going through my mind lately and how is that related to my blogging on here. ~ I always try to be transparent with my thoughts and emotions even if they aren't nice or pretty... I don't believe anyone is perfect and it's a shame to think I need to be, right? ^w^''

As you may have noticed already, I am currently in a bit of a blogging slump lately… (And I have been for weeks/months now.) It’s been hard for me to try and get out a good blog post with interesting content at least once a week.

It’s also been particularly hard to try and make different outfits that are « blog worthy » each week… Sometimes I would post outfits that I wasn’t proud of or that the pictures aren’t nice quality just because I needed to have an outfit post out or I won’t be blogging at all that week… I’ve been stressed out about what to wear each day instead of feeling proud and inspired… It was never my goal in the first place with the fashion I love so much… ;w; It’s affected me a lot regarding to my self confidence and capacity to have « perfect » outfits on the daily and I would beat myself up with that, a lot…

So I decided to change some things regarding to my outfit posts! From now on, I won’t be posting every single Lolita outfit I wear for work/casually. I’ll change my outfit schedule to one or two outfit posts a month with my « best of » outfits from the last few weeks. These outfit may include special outfits I’ve worn to go out/for events, daily outfits in which I am particularly proud of my coordination/theme/colour scheme and outfits in which I try something new with my accessories, hairstyle or makeup, for example.

I’ll also change my blogging schedule to once a week, or maybe less than that... It’s been that way already for a while but from now on I won’t be feeling guilty to only post once a week and maybe skip some weeks sometimes if I have nothing interesting to blog about… XD;

I hope you guys will still follow my blogging adventures and my lifestyle Lolita journey with me! ~

Until next time my precious warm blankets, take care! :3

An*Tai*Na Shoes & My-Lolita-Dress Shopping Service Review! ~

Hello my sparkling blue velvet bows! ~

I'm back on my blog today with something I haven't done in a while, a Lolita fashion review! ^w^ The Prince was kind enough to offer me for my birthday something I needed to replace in my closet for a while; A pair of pink shoes and a pair of lilac shoes! :3

So this time I'm going to review them for you! They are from the brand An*Tai*Na and I got them through My-Lolita-Dress as it is usually my go-to shopping service for Taobao merch! ~

My-Lolita-Dress Shopping Service

As I said earlier, My-Lolita-Dress have been my go-to shopping service for years, probably since they have launched in... 2013 I think? I've never had any problems with them and I have made several orders with them through the years.

However, this time their service felt different from usual... Firstly, I didn't get a confirmation email of my order like I used to have before... ;w;'' I got the Paypal receipt after I paid for my shoes (Around September 15th) but no confirmation email from them which was weird to me since it seems like it was sent automatically before? I was a little worried so I contacted them around two weeks later to get an update for my order since that seemed a bit weird to me and I wondered if my order went through... They responded to my email the same day telling that my shoes were going to be shipped around October 9th which was fine with me. ~

Shipping

I received my order on October 21th. ~ It took 7 business days, more or less, to ship from China to Canada, which was very reasonable for the shipping time to me. The shipping was around 32$ USD which was around 42$ CAD which isn't that bad for two pairs of shoes from China. I chose the regular airmail untracked shipping since I always seem to get hit with customs when I chose DHL or EMS with My-Lolita-Dress orders... This time I didn't get customs and it was faster then the estimated shipping time too so I was pretty happy with that! ^w^

The two pairs of shoes came in a bigger shoe box that was shipped in a shipping bag. They were packaged in the same box so I was worried that I only got one pair but both were packaged in there. There wasn't any special protection in the shoe box other than some tissue paper around each shoe... They weren't damaged or scuffed in the shipping process though. ;o;''

Quality & Price

As usual with An*Tai*Na shoes, they are pretty good quality as far as Lolita shoes goes! ~ I paid around 42$ USD which is around 55$ CAD for each pair. For me personally it's a reasonable price for Lolita shoes, especially since I am very picky with the style of shoes I like to wear and I cannot find designs I like easily... (I prefer a low heel and a simple design with fewer straps to wear on the daily but I like when shoes have more "special" touches like intricate bows and stuff! ^w^)

One thing that bothers me a bit is that on the pink pair of shoes the bow "tails" kind of flip the other way around instead of laying on the top of the shoe like the lilac pair... But I am pretty sure that was because the way they were packaged during the shipping. I may try to tape them down for a bit to see if it helps replacing them correctly... If I am not too lazy about it... XD;

Fit & Sizing

When I first tried them on, I was so pleasantly surprised a how comfy they were compared to my other An*Tai*Na shoes! ^o^/ It's almost as they weren't made by the same brand! (I was almost dreading to order new shoes for so long because I knew I was going to have to break them in and how painful it would be... ^w^'') I've always said that Bodyline was my go-to brand for comfy Lolita shoes but An*Tai*Na must have fixed that problem since I feel like the "toe box" for their shoes was made significantly larger than on my other shoes I own from them that were purchased a long while ago. ~

As for the sizing, I was surprised to see that they were a bit bigger/longer than my other shoes from them... I made sure to look back at my previous shoes order to order the same size as before (which is a size 36, as I am usually between a size 5 and 6 in US/Canada shoes sizing). I can't say that they are definitely too big for me; I could adjust them to my liking with the straps, but there is quite a significant "wiggle room" in them. If I order shoes from them again in the near future I would probably size down a bit and get a size 35.5 or 35 next time. ^w^''

Overall

I am overall satisfied with my order and my new shoes! ^w^ The ordering process was easy and I could have emailed them earlier to reassure myself about not getting the confirmation email instead of worrying so I take the blame on that part. XD; The shoes are nice quality, they are probably the comfiest pairs of shoes I own now which makes me want to wear them even more! ~ The colours are beautiful and they match nicely with what I have in my closet. I'm a little disappointed that they changed their sizing compared to their past models of shoes but I could adjust them so they fit nicely and more snug on my feet so it worked out fine in the end. :3

I hope you liked my little review, I was a little bit rusty since I don't write them too often, haha! XD;

Until next time my precious minty flowery teacups, take care! ^w^